Received 15 January 2001 ; received in revised form 30 May 2002; accepted 26 June 2002

Abstract

Over the past 20 years the growth of Chinas agricultural economy has been extraordinary. However, it seems unlikely that China will maintain self-sufficiency in grains by 2005 without substantial intervention. We develop a CGE model to assess the options available to Chinese policy makers. We compare the welfare effects of import tariffs and domestic support, and explore the potential of biotechnology as a means to achieve self-sufficiency through improvements in agricultural productivity. Our results indicate that the price interventions that would be required to maintain Chinas desired self-sufficiency ratios are considerable, and are unlikely to be compatible with WTO accession. The productivity improvements required are also significant, and likely beyond the current potential of biotechnology. 0 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

JEL classijication: C68; F13; 053; Q17

Keyword.s: Biotechnology; Chinese agriculture; CGE

1. Introduction

Since the announcement of Chinas duiwui kaifung zhengce, or open door policy in 1978, the growth in Chinas overall and agricultural economies has been extraordinary. Between 1979 and 1984, GDP grew by an average of 8.5% per year, accelerating to 9.7% per year between 1985 and 1995 (a significant increase over 1970s levels, which averaged 4.9%). The value of agricultural output grew by an annual average of 7.5% from 1979 to 1984, and 5.6% between 1985 and 1995, compared to only 2.3% between 1970 and 1978 (Huang et al., 1999a). However, despite unprecedented growth over the last two decades, concern has been raised over the capacity of China to feed its population

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in the future. Brown (1995) published the most pes- simistic predictions, evoking the spectres of soaring world grain prices and starvation in poor countries.

While the magnitudes of Browns estimates have been seriously questioned (Fan and Agcaoili-Sombilla, 1997; Yang and Huang, 1997), the emergence of a substantial grain deficit in China is now considered likely. Chinas grain markets are projected to ex- perience a sustained increase in demand driven by population growth, rapid urbanisation, rising income levels and the expansion of the livestock sector as a consequence of burgeoning meat consumption.

In the absence of intervention, the expected increase in demand for grains is unlikely to be matched by compensating shifts in supply. There are a number of factors which may limit supply response in China. Most important are land scarcity, the transition of land,

labour and capital to non-agricultural uses, a slow- down in yield growth, and environmental degrada- tion (erosion, salinisation). With roughly 10% of the worlds arable land but 22% of the worlds popula- tion, Chinas comparative advantage is likely to shift from land-intensive commodities to labour-intensive products.

Despite what economists have seen as an inevitable decline in agricultural comparative advantage, the Chinese government has set food self-sufficiency as a declared goal in its long-term plan. Although the objective has not been clearly defined in terms of a commodity category, it has been widely interpreted as meaning that domestic production of grains should meet at least 95% of domestic demand (Yang and Huang, 1997; Anderson and Peng, 1998).

Given the projections of substantial grain deficits, how can we evaluate the potential for meeting the objective of grain self-sufficiency? Clearly, declining self-sufficiency ratios are by no means inevitable, they are under government control. There are (at least) three

possibilities for maintaining a given self-sufficiency level: border measures (tariffs), domestic support or improvements in productivity. The first two distort the prices faced by agents in the economy, altering the in- centives to produce andlor import. Any given target ratio of grain imports can clearly be achieved, but at the price of introducing allocative inefficiency to the economy. Moreover, such policies may be in conflict with Chinas accession to the World Trade Organi- sation (WTO), approved late in 2001. The research question is effectively one of identifying the economic cost for China and the world economy of achieving self-sufficiency through these means.

The third possibility, productivity improvements, may arise from a variety of sources. A source of partic- ular interest is through the use of biotechnology. The adoption of genetically modified (GM) crops offers the potential for improved efficiency, increased yields, and reduced production costs. The key question for China is whether or not, given what we know about poten- tial yield increases with the adoption of GM crops and what we project about future grain deficits, it is feasi- ble that self-sufficiency could be attained through the use of biotechnology.

To assess these questions we utilise a multi-region computable general equilibrium (CGE) model, which we project to 2005 and use to simulate various policy responses to the anticipated trade pattern. Our sim- ulation procedure accounts for accession by China to the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture (URAA). The remainder of the paper is organised as follows. In Section 2, we review grain supply and demand projections for China and the implications of possible policy responses. In Section 3, we look at the evidence on biotechnology as a source of pro- ductivity growth. Section 4 contains a description of the modelling framework utilised in the paper, while Section 5 presents the results of our simulations and policy discussion. Finally, Section 6 contains a sum- mary and concluding comments.

2. Chinas grain deficit and self-sufficiency objectives

The agricultural reforms implemented in China from the end of the 1970s were designed to fos- ter the transition from a command economy to an

Note: Figures in brackets represent the deficit as a percentage of 1995 grain domestic production.

incentive-based system: individual rewards tied to output (the household responsibility system), spe- cialisation of agriculture, an increase in procurement prices to stimulate production, the establishment of quasi-private property rights (land ownership now rests with the village, but land is leased to households for up to 30 years), and the progressive relaxation of the restrictions on labour mobility out of agriculture.

The reforms resulted in a dramatic increase in total grain production (65% between 1978 and 1996). Agri- cultural productivity also increased sharply. Huang et al. (1999b) estimate a 54% increase in total factor productivity for rice, 121% for wheat, 71% for soy- beans and 85% for maize, between 1979 and 1995. China even became an occasional net exporter of grains. However, by the second half of the 1980s, it had become evident that the growth in grain supply was not keeping pace with the increasing demand that followed the enormous growth of the Chinese economy and the expansion of industrial sectors.

Since the beginning of the 1990s, domestic grain prices in China have reached levels comparable to international prices. Brown (1995) predicted that, if present trends persist, in 2030 China would need to import 370 million metric tons (MT) of grain. Given that world exports of grain were about 200 million MT in 1995, this would have implied a significant increase in international prices and the prospect of starvation in low-income, food-importing countries. The weak- ness of Browns methodology, which was based on simple extrapolations of historical data, is now widely recognised (Fan and Agcaoili-Sombilla, 1997; Yang and Huang, 1997; Anderson and Peng, 1998).

Several other attempts have been made to forecast the future international grain trade with China, utilis- ing both partial equilibrium (Mitchell and Ingco, 1993; OECF, 1995; Rosegrant et al., 1995; ERS/USDA, 1996; Huang et al., 1999a,b) and general equilibrium

approaches (Yang and Huang, 1997). Forecasts that allow quantity projections are summarised in Table 1, which is an extension of a summary table constructed by Fan and Agcaoili-Sombilla (1997). The studies all forecast grain deficits up to 2005, although Huang et al. (1999b) argue that the deficits will slowly decline thereafter, as population growth slows. Nevertheless, the capacity of China to fulfil its grain requirement with its own production remains an important item on the agenda of policy makers. In addition to na- tional pride and food security issues, motivations for this objective include protecting China from fluctu- ations in grain prices in world markets, avoiding a shortage of foreign currency, protecting farm incomes to counterbalance the raising inequality between ru- ral and urban households and preventing the social unrest that might result from increased dependence on foreign staple commodities and increased income inequality.

From the perspective of the theory of commercial policy, the goal of self-sufficiency is termed a non- economic objective. The analysis of non-economic objectives was pioneered by B hagwati and Srinivasen (1969), but the case of a self-sufficiency objective was analysed even earlier by Johnson (1960). Here, we reconsider three possible approaches to achieving self-sufficiency: border protection, domestic support, and productivity improvements.

An import tariff on grain would have the effect of raising the domestic grain price relative to the world price, thereby constraining domestic consumption and encouraging domestic production. As is well known, such an approach introduces an allocative efficiency

The variations among these studies in terms of the projections of grain supply can be explained in terms of the underlying model assumptions. Fan and Agcaoili-Sonibilla (1997) discuss these issues in detail.

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(dead weight) loss to the economy, by forcing re- sources that would produce higher value elsewhere into grain production, and by eliminating grain con- sumption where the marginal social benefit of con- sumption exceeds the marginal social cost (the world price) but not the marginal private cost (the domestic price). It is therefore socially inefficient.

In effect, an import tariff is equivalent to a pro- duction subsidy combined with a consumption tax, with both applied at the same percentage rate. Either of these two policies could be used independently to achieve a self-sufficiency objective, although produc- tion subsidies are likely to be more palatable. A pro- duction subsidy achieves self-sufficiency exclusively by expanding grain production, and a consumption tax exclusively by curtailing domestic grain consumption. Clearly, either policy will introduce an allocative ef- ficiency loss. Moreover, for a given import volume target, and assuming substitution in production and consumption, both a production subsidy and a con- sumption tax will be inefficient mechanisms to achieve self-sufficiency relative to a tariff because a tariff can simultaneously exploit both methods of constraining imports, which is the objective.

The use of both import tariffs and output subsidies on agriculture is constrained by WTO rules. Since it has now acceded to the WTO, China will be con- strained in its ability to raise tariffs above bound levels. Moreover, it may face action over domestic support that can be shown to adversely affect trading partners, although there is considerably more latitude here than in the case of tariffs. It is also likely that pressure will continue to build in upcoming multilat- eral negotiations for agricultural trade liberalisation beyond that committed under the URAA. Hence, in addition to efficiency considerations, China may face political constraints on the use of the price mechanism to achieve its goals.

Another way of achieving a grain self-sufficiency objective is to improve Chinese agricultural produc- tivity. As discussed above, the growth in Chinas agricultural productivity over the period of reform has been substantial, although we may debate the extent to which this merely represents moving towards the efficiency locus. Improving productivity implies no conflict with the pledge of future agricultural liberal- isation. Moreover, at least in the absence of external- ities and/or second-best effects, it should not result in

allocative efficiency losses like those associated with tariffs and domestic support.

However, productivity improvements cannot be reaped without effort, they require investment both in research and institutional innovation, and there may be considerable uncertainty over the end result. Furthermore, little is known about the magnitude of productivity improvements that would likely to be required in order to achieve Chinas self-sufficiency objectives. In Section 3, we consider the extent of improvements that have been associated with the adoption of biotechnology and genetically modified organisms (GMOs).